never seem to fit
by lenny
Summary: You look down at your arms and your skin is blue, he shuffles his feet and pulls you against him, presses his lips quickly against yours, and lets you go.


It's been a week since he first kissed you, hastily, standing out in a parking lot under booming fluorescent lights. You look down at your arms and your skin is blue, he shuffles his feet and pulls you against him, presses his lips quickly against yours, and lets you go. In one quick motion, now your head is spinning and you stumble backwards as he releases you, almost pushes you away. He doesn't even look you in the eye, just mutters something unintelligible and walks away. The next day when he passes by you in the hall and smacks a cheerleader on the ass, you think for a second that you might be disappointed he didn't pull you into a closet and touch your face and whisper into your hair, but you start to feel sick and so you try to forget his lips.

A couple of days later he lays you down on the couch without pretense, tongue down your throat, and you think maybe you were wrong. Your clothes fall to the floor and his mouth is absolutely everywhere and you promise yourself that you won't cry. New fingerprints are ghosting old ones on your skin. No matter how many times you tried to wash them away they were still there, written on your skin and in your blood. You've been wanting forgiveness, forgetting, maybe even love, but you have to think that this is all you deserve right now, all you could possibly handle. It's more than you can handle. His fingers slide in and you bite your lip, taste blood, feel warm and cold all at the same time. No, you think to yourself, no, you say out loud, and you're standing up and clutching your clothes to your naked body and running out the door before your mind can even tell you to open your lungs and breathe.

You feel like a fool. You've been telling yourself how fucked up you are for a long time now, that no one could ever love you again. You know you need to stop running, but you don't know where to fall. So you show up at his door at three in the morning with a bottle of tequila, wearing your best black underwear, and he takes you on the kitchen floor as you try and convince yourself that everything is okay. He throws up in the bathroom later, your fingers skimming across his hairline, trailing along the sweat beading there. You hear the toilet flush and suddenly you're in his mouth again, the faucet is crushing against your ribcage and if you weren't so drunk you might care that he tastes like liquor and vomit. He carries you into the bedroom, legs wrapped around him, and he fucks you until you can't remember your name.The next morning you're a tangled mess of white sheets and sticky skin and bruises, alone. Empty bottles in the hallway, television buzzing in the next room, and he's not there. You take a shower and dig your fingernails into your palms, dress in last night's clothes and leave. He'll call. What you shared was special, and overwhelming, and he'll call.

He doesn't. His phone is off, seventeen times it goes straight to voicemail, so you wear your shortest skirt and pull back your hair and walk up and down the sidewalk because you don't know where to go. Twilight falls into place, the sun slides down behind the horizon, the moon is a sliver in the sky, and the streetlights buzz on. Your skin is blue again, fluorescent flowing glow, but you still won't think about his lips. You can't.

Doors slam closed nearby and you start to walk, fast, but you hear footsteps behind you. Sharp turn around the side of the building, the denim rubs against your thighs and you stumble and lean against the wall, breath catching in your throat. There's a hand on your shoulder, you turn around and feel rough fingers against your cheek. There are dark shadows beneath his eyes, several days stubble along his jaw, and it scratches as he kisses you. Your body aligns with his, when his arms are around you, fingers digging into your skin, teeth pulling at your neck, you almost feel safe. You feel like maybe someday you could forget. The numbness has been starting to fade. You want it back. You want to feel cold again. You tell yourself he helps you forget. He keeps away the ghosts.

A moan slips past your lips, and he presses you up against the wall, brick rough against your back. As your hand brushes across his stomach he growls, hands wrapping around your neck, pushing hard, and your head slams back onto the wall. Your eyes slide closed as his leg slips between your thighs, you keep your eyes shut tight and your hands trip through the dark, run along the cotton of his side. Apparently you're taking too long because you can hear his belt snap, zipper open, his hand fumbles beneath your skirt for a second and he pushes into you as his nails scratch down your arm. There's gravel in your skin, your hair is twisted in his fingers, lip caught between his teeth. The thick black in the back of your mind starts to call out, someone you could see you, but you almost wish they would. You wish someone would walk around the corner of that building and see your skirt pulled up around your hips, his tongue brushing up across your ear, pumping into you, the heat, then they would know that you're no longer that girl with the dead crazy boyfriend, but he yanks on your hair and your head slams, bounces off the bricks again and the voice goes away.

His hand is underneath your shirt, he's inside you, you kind of wish he would moan your name, just once. You want to hear it on his lips, hear the validation, hear the desperate way his tongue curls around the letters, the way he needs you, only you, the way you make him feel. He begins to shudder, bucks against you, stares intently at the wall as he comes. You start to reach up and brush away the tear you see rolling down his jaw, then think better of it.

You're being fucked against a wall behind your dorm, eyes closed, tears squeezing out, but you're forgetting. You couldn't be loved before, but maybe now you can. Maybe now things have changed. Maybe now you can fit.


End file.
